


Everything a Word Can Mean

by OTPshipper98



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Cuddles, Drunken Confessions, Foot Massage, Getting Together, Happy Ending, Hogwarts Era, M/M, Nicknames, Post-Hogwarts, Pre-Hogwarts, Sectumsempra Scars, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-03
Updated: 2019-11-03
Packaged: 2021-01-21 10:49:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21298217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OTPshipper98/pseuds/OTPshipper98
Summary: In a world where magical people are born with the nickname their soulmate will call them by tattooed on their skin... what does it mean that the word on Harry's chest is the thing he hates to be called the most?
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter, Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Comments: 130
Kudos: 2651





	Everything a Word Can Mean

**Author's Note:**

> Based on [this textpost](https://rockmarina.tumblr.com/post/188711261338/its-the-31st-of-july-1980-lily-potter-is-in), beta'd by Spaceaas!

The Dursleys never acknowledged it; never explained. It was just one more tally on a list of things that made him weird. That made him _wrong_.

Harry liked to stare down at it while he showered and imagine a thousand different reasons the word _Saviour _was tattooed on his chest, the ink a deep black that faded into gold around the sharp edges of the letters. He imagined himself flying like Superman did in the comics they kept on the highest shelf of the school library—imagined himself stopping comets from crashing against the planet with his bare hands, saving babies from raging fires.

In his daydreams, it never mattered if he got hurt. It only mattered that no one else did.

And then one night Hagrid stomped—quite literally—into his life, and he _explained_. He explained about Voldemort, about the magical world, about his parents. About the lightning bolt scar.

About the tattoo.

“It’s a soulmark,” he said. “Every witch and wizard has one. It’s meant to symbolise the nickname that your soulmate will give you when you’re together.”

“Do you have a soulmark?” Harry asked him, awed.

Hagrid laughed bitterly. “Nah. My only true loves are magical creatures anyway.” He leaned forward, as though to tell Harry a secret. “You have to be cautious who you share your soulmark with,” he said. “Could be dangerous if too many people knew. Especially with you being Harry Potter. There are… speculations, you see.”

“Oh.” Harry frowned. “What do people think it says?”

“Eh, the usual, you know. Love, honey… many people claim to _know _that it says whatever their daughter’s favourite word is. Very creepy, if you ask me.”

Harry nodded. “And what do _you _think it says?”

“Me?” Hagrid seemed uncomfortable by the question. “Well… Dumbledore wouldn’t tell me when we dropped you off at your Aunt’s, so I’ve been trying not to think about it, you know.”

“I don’t mind telling you,” Harry said.

“Really?” Hagrid’s face lit up. “Y-you don’t have to, but—”

Harry snickered, and told him.

He didn’t understand why Hagrid had to wipe away a few tears.

***

The first time he was called _saviour _was in his second year. Ginny, waking up beside him in the Hospital Wing and surrounded by her family, had murmured it without realising.

From the other side of her bed, Ron had given Harry an indecipherable look.

Ron’s tattoo was the word _Idiot_, neatly written on his ankle. Harry also knew Neville’s hip said _Schnuckums_, and he’d caught the word _Flitterby _inscribed in Ginny’s wrist when he’d rescued her from the Chamber of Secrets.

He didn’t think he would ever say such a word. Still, assuming he was Ginny’s soulmate was the obvious conclusion for any twelve-year-old, and Harry spent the next two years convincing himself he and Ginny were meant for each other.

And then Fleur Delacour called him a saviour when he emerged from the lake with her sister.

To be fair, Ron had been called an idiot by quite a number of people by then, including McGonagall, Hooch, all of his siblings and half their Gryffindor classmates, so Harry rationally knew that anyone could call another person by their soulmark nickname and not be their soulmate.

And yet, he spent a whole month sending increasingly confused letters to Sirius before he came to the conclusion that he liked playing Quidditch with Ginny more than he liked holding her hand.

***

Ron returned to the forest. Hermione, deep bags under her eyes, tears threatening to come out, called him an idiot, and then stormed over to where he was awkwardly standing, launched into his arms, and kissed him.

She’d never told them about her soulmark, but that night Harry learnt the word _Love _was neatly tattooed on her ankle.

On the same place as Ron’s, then.

***

Harry tore out the page of the Daily Prophet. Then he tore it into small, small pieces until his picture was no longer moving, until the headline—_Saviour returns to Hogwarts_—turned into a soup of letters in his hands.

As he threw the bits into the flames, he thought about his parents. He wondered, for what seemed like the thousandth time since he’d first stepped into the Gryffindor common room, if this had been the first place his mum had called his dad a _Toerag_. If this had been the place where he’d called her his _Princess_.

He’d never had the chance to ask Sirius about it. The only time they had talked about soulmates, Sirius had told him no matter how many people called him by the word on his chest, when the right person did it Harry would know. But when Harry had asked Sirius if he’d ever felt that, his expression had turned sombre as he’d shaken his head.

Now, Harry wondered if Sirius had even known what he was talking about. If it was all utter bullshit: the _knowing_, the butterflies and fireworks he’d imagined after hearing Sirius’ words, the very idea that there was someone out there—someone who would call him _saviour_, of all things—meant for him at all. If soulmates existed at all, or if it was all a bad joke meant to make him feel like he wasn’t destined to always be alone, even when he was surrounded by people.

***

Things were supposed to be better after the war ended. Harry guessed they were; all around him, the world was pulling itself back together. In a similar way to how his two best friends clung to one another and brought each other up, the castle was slowly becoming the warm, welcoming home it had always been, and so were its inhabitants.

Harry felt like he was sinking. Like he was too broken to be repaired, the wound so deep that nobody seemed to notice it was there.

Perhaps that was what drew him to Malfoy.

Malfoy, who looked broken, and tired, and as full of hurt as Harry felt. Malfoy, who took months of sitting in silence beside Harry, of half-hearted fights and sleepless nights in the Hogwarts corridors, to open up and tell Harry that nothing felt worth fighting for anymore.

Malfoy, who, a few months after the school year ended, rolled his eyes and mumbled the words _bloody saviour _as he accepted Harry’s scarf. He’d started sneezing uncontrollably, not dressed appropriately for the changing November weather.

It took Harry longer than it should have to notice—or perhaps to admit—that the word felt different when it fell from Draco’s lips. That the way Draco would use the word to point out the most mundane things Harry did, the way he’d catch Harry’s smile a moment later, always filled his chest with warmth.

That Draco was the first person to not make him hate the word in a very, very long time.

***

Soon the word became an inside joke between them. Soon, it began to come with soft brushes of hands, with private shared looks of mischief, of complicity. Soon, Draco would call him his _saviour _as Harry handed him the sugar bowl and Harry would just smile into Draco’s neck, and Draco would lean closer, allowing Harry to hide his smile for a second.

He didn’t know why he hadn’t told Draco yet. That _saviour _was his soulmark. That he was the first person that had made the word sound okay to his ears.

That he wanted him. That being around him was easy as breathing.

Okay, maybe he _did _know, even if he tried not to think about it.

He was scared. Scared that this would end—that he was mistaken, and Draco wasn’t really meant for him. After all, wouldn’t Harry have started calling Draco by some cheesy name by now if it was real? Wouldn’t they have talked about it at all?

“Has anyone ever called you by your soulmark?” Harry asked one night. They were slouched on the sofa of Harry’s shitty flat, as they often did these days, watching some crappy show and snapping back at the telly from time to time.

They never talked about their soulmarks. It made sense, Harry knew it—knowing what someone else’s mark was before you started calling them by it felt a lot like cheating.

Still, his mind wouldn’t stay quiet; wouldn’t stop telling him all of this, all he had with Draco, would disappear any moment like sand in the wind.

“Plenty,” Draco said, gaze weirdly fixed on the TV. They usually looked at each other more than the screen, each slumped on one arm of the sofa, legs tangled.

He was trying to hide a reaction, Harry knew.

“Me too.” Harry trailed his eyes to the screen too, but it didn’t catch his interest. He eyed Draco again. “Anyone feel different from the rest?”

Draco met Harry’s gaze. Then he eyed the clock. “I should get going.”

Harry slept badly that night, drowning in thoughts of Draco leaving. Of Draco being called by the word on his skin—a word Harry surely hadn’t said before and would never think to say—by plenty of people. What if Draco was destined for Harry, but someone else was destined for Draco?

***

He stumbled out of the elevator, Draco resting all of his weight on him. As he fumbled with the keys, Draco slurred into his ear. “You really are a saviour, huh?”

“And you’re really drunk,” Harry said, pushing the door open. “Sit down here a second, I’ll make up the sofa-bed.”

“Sleep with me.”

Harry spluttered—pulled back when Draco, leaning dangerously from the chair, tried to grab his jacket. “Wait here,” he said, a little breathless, and disappeared into the living room.

But when he walked back into the kitchen, heart in his throat, Draco’s words whirling in his mind, Draco wasn’t there.

Harry found him in the bedroom, sat on the bed, a deep frown scrunching his face as he tried to fumble with the buttons of his own shirt. He’d gotten halfway through, and Harry rushed toward him even though the sight had made something in him stir.

“Hey, stop that—” he started. But Draco, upon realising Harry was back, stood up and stumbled backwards, yanking the top of his shirt, as if to show Harry—

“Yeah, I know. Funny, isn’t it,” Draco said, although there was nothing funny about what Harry was seeing. “You slayed my soulmark in half and then became the sole person that makes my own name mean anything to me.” He laughed to himself.

_Draco_. The word, tattooed just below the sharp line of his collarbone, was split in half by an angry, deep scar that made the _c _almost nonexistent.

“We’re…” Harry started, not daring to finish the sentence.

Draco huffed, his sneer exaggerated by the alcohol. “Don’t be daft, Potty. Just because you say my name from time to time it doesn’t mean _I _would ever say whatever stupid, cheesy nonsense you have tattooed on your pretty arse—”

Harry pulled at the neck of his shirt, pushing aside the flap of his open denim jacket for Draco to see the word written under his collarbone.

“Not on my _arse_,” he muttered when Draco just stared at his chest.

A moment later, Draco shook his head. “But—I—didn’t—”

“You didn’t think that word could ever be my soulmark?” Harry asked. “Welcome to my world of disappointment.”

“I—” He shook his head again, stepped closer. “Only called you _that _because you’d… you’d started calling me by my name, and it felt so…” Draco touched Harry’s chest. He probably meant for it to be gentle, but he was unstable on his feet and ended up leaning forward, eyes closed, his weight on his palm where it pressed into Harry’s skin. “I was terrified. That you’d… that you’d notice. It couldn’t be you. _I_”—Draco frowned as though in pain—“couldn’t be for you. So I just—thought of the most ridiculous thing to call you, something that you would absolutely _not _have on your skin, under any circumstances, and I started calling you that so I wouldn’t call you anything else.”

Harry scoffed. At their luck; at the relief that was washing over him. “Good job,” he murmured, and Draco, emitting a low, pained whine, leaned into him completely, resting his chin on Harry’s shoulder.

“Does this mean I can sleep in your bed?” he asked after a long moment.

“Wouldn’t you like that.” Harry, an almost painful smile pulling at his lips, walked a grumbling Draco back to the sofa.

***

“Hey there,” Harry said. All that came from the bed was a low groan as Draco turned around. He’d gotten out of his work robes and not bothered with his pyjamas, and his eyes were barely open. “Long day at work?”

“Like you wouldn’t imagine,” Draco muttered, even though Harry knew he would hear all about it soon enough. “Hmph. Can’t wait to retire.”

Harry sat on the edge of the bed—pushed his shoes off. “My poor, poor Draco.” He laughed softly, nuzzling Draco’s neck between the sheets. Draco immediately grabbed at him and made him fall on his stomach into the blankets. “Still a few years till that happens, I’m afraid.”

“Hmphh,” Draco repeated by way of an answer. He sniffed Harry’s hair.

“Want me to make dinner?”

“Maybe.”

“Maybe?” Harry asked, amused.

“Not as much as I want you to stay in bed with me all evening,” Draco murmured.

“There’s an easy solution for that,” Harry said, taking his phone out. “Pizza or sushi?”

“Sushi.” Draco snuggled closer, then scowled. “Take off those hideous jeans.”

“Okay, okay, one second,” Harry laughed as Draco dragged him under the covers. He re-ordered their latest order and left the phone on the nightstand, then pushed his clothes down. “Gimme a foot.”

Draco squirmed in bed and draped a leg on Harry’s chest. When Harry started massaging the sole of his foot, he sighed, a smile finally revealing Harry’s favourite lines on Draco’s face, rather than the ones that formed when he frowned. “Mmm. My saviour.”

Harry smiled and kissed Draco’s knee.

**Author's Note:**

> **Check out the incrdible fanart that Sanderiart made for this fic [here](https://sanderiart.tumblr.com/post/612802499238395904/harry-liked-to-stare-down-at-it-while-he-showered)!** 😳😍
> 
> Even if this is an old fic, kudos, comments and bookmarks are still incredibly appreciated! ❤️

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Podfic - Everything a Word Can Mean](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22084771) by [CheekyTorah](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CheekyTorah/pseuds/CheekyTorah)


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